


Sweet Sixteen

by alessandralee



Category: Girl Meets World
Genre: Birthday, F/M, First Kiss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-04
Updated: 2015-09-04
Packaged: 2018-04-19 00:46:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4726469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alessandralee/pseuds/alessandralee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lucas finds Maya out on the fire escape, ducking out of clean up after her birthday party.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sweet Sixteen

“You should come in before you get sick,” Lucas pops his head out of Maya’s window to tell her.

“That’s an old wives’ tale,” she dismisses his concern.

“Then you should come in and say goodbye before the Matthews’ leave with the rest of your cake.”

Maya pulls herself up into a sitting position just so she can glare at him, “Riley fell asleep on the couch an hour ago. Cory and Topanga are probably more concerned about getting her into a cab without waking her up than me saying goodbye.”

Lucas pushes the window open all the way and slides out of it onto the fire escape. He’s wearing his coat, so either he was on her way out, or he was expecting to join her.

Maya’s guessing it’s the latter.

In defeat, she rolls backwards until she’s lying down again.

“You know this fire escape might not be up to code,” she makes one last attempt to get him to leave, even shaking back and forth so the metal bars clank together. “Your extra weight might send us crashing to our deaths.”

“You and Riley are out here all the time,” he reminds her.

“Riley’s a fifteen year old girl, not a varsity baseball player,” Maya says.

Lucas doesn’t budge, and Maya doesn’t push the issue any further.

“They all done cleaning up?” she asks. She’s out here specifically to avoid that.

It is, after all, her birthday. She should be exempted from clean up duties.

“Yep.”

“You helped?”

“Of course.”

Lucas has been in New York for years not, but they can’t seem to shake the Boy Scout out of him. At this point, Maya’s not even sure she wants to. It’s as much of a constant in her life as Riley’s eternal optimism, Farkle’s drive to succeed and Zay’s surprises.

“So is sweet sixteen everything you dreamed of?” Lucas asks, taking a seat next to her sprawled out body, with his legs dangling off the metal platform.

Maya snorts. She lets herself dream a lot more these days, but those dreams are a bit bigger than the candle ceremony at Missy Bradford’s party.

Art school. Backpacking through Europe. Paris.

“Well it’s definitely better than Shawn’s original idea for the party,” she admits.

It had involved dinner at Planet Hollywood. Maybe Shawn used to be cool; Cory’s certainly told them all that he was. But the guy is seriously out of touch these days.

Instead, she’d asked for potluck dinner, attended by her friends and some of their parents. Farkle’s dad had excused himself after dessert, but the other adults had stayed up and talked while the kids watched movies and played board games.

Nothing fancy, nothing special, but exactly what she wanted.

Maya especially loved the leather jacket her friends had chipped in to get her.

“But you’re still hiding out here,” Lucas nudges her head with his hip until she sits up next to him.

“What can I say? I like it up here,” Maya admits.

It’s not as classy as Riley’s bay window, but it’s her favorite part of the apartment she, Katy, and Shawn moved into over the summer.

“Even when it’s freezing?” Lucas asks.

He still hasn’t adjusted to New York Winters.

Maya shrugs, “I’m wearing a jacket.”

Leather jackets were not made for January nights. She probably should have at least grabbed gloves; her hands are freezing in her pockets. Lucas has a coat, scarf, gloves, and the hood of his sweatshirt pulled up. He should be warm. He looks a lot warmer than her, despite his complaints about the weather.

For a moment, Maya thinks a traitorous thought about huddling up against him for warmth. She mentally shoves it aside.

She’s gotten good at doing that.

Lucas and Riley officially “broke up” in the eighth grade. Looking back, Maya’s not sure they were ever really in a relationship.

Still, that’s not something she wants to get tangled up in. So she’s resigned herself to pushing away any conflicting thoughts about him, and just occasionally enjoying an artist’s appreciation or his broad shoulders and full lashes.

It’s not as hard as she thought it would be. They don’t really spend that much time alone together.

Except for now.

“Thanks for the jacket,” Maya says, in a bid to find a new topic for her thoughts.

She already thanked everyone when she unwrapped it.

“Riley picked it out,” Lucas replies.

He already told her that.

Clearly, the cold is getting to their brains, because neither one of them can think of anything to say next. Maya’s too aware of Lucas’s proximity to even think of a snarky quip.

And Lucas is… she can’t even guess.

So Maya does a fake shiver, and announces, “I’m ready to go in.”

Lucas gets to his feet and hops through the window first. He waits for her a few steps into his room, and she nearly falls on top of him getting back inside.

It’s the opposite of helpful.

Maya refuses to look him in the eye. She focuses on what’s in front of her, one of the toggles on his coat. She waits for him to step backwards, give her a little space.

He doesn’t.

Slowly, Maya looks up. With the way he’s looking at her, so focused, she can guess where this is heading.

And she could stop it. She could step back, or make a joke, or just run away.

But, right now, she doesn’t want to.

Lucas grips her left elbow with his right hand and leans down. She rises onto her tiptoes.

It’s not her first kiss, but it’s the first one that’s felt like something more than some guy eager to shove his tongue down her throat. Lucas doesn’t even try that.

It’s gentle, in a way she’s come to expect from Lucas, careful. His lips are light against her own, like part of him is still expecting her to push him away.

She does the opposite, resting her hands on his shoulders to pull him in close and deepen the kiss. He obliges.

The angle is awkward, thanks the difference between their heights. Maya’s neck twinges a little, but she’s not interested in stopping. Lucas’s left hand cradles her cheek.

Maya sighs, actually sighs, and it’s enough to startle them both. They spring apart, faces flushed red.

No one says anything. Maya doesn’t think she can say anything.

“Happy birthday,” Lucas eventually manages.

Maya nods.

“I’m gonna go,” he adds.

Maya nods again.

“Are you just gonna—“

“Yeah,” she cuts him off.

“Okay.”

He exits the room, and she can hear his footsteps pause in the hallway before he offers Shawn and Katy a polite goodnight.

He sounds calm and composed. He sounds like his normal self.

Maya feels like anything but.


End file.
